Kinophile

Damn cheating hedge armor!

Durrr. Fixed. Thanks Gnarly, too many tabs at once!

Although... Just noticed this. One of my heavy AFVs (that's all you get, Abbasid!) has thermals for certain, yet the arty smoke indicated is blocking its LOS. So.....this reopens the question for me.

Woops

Yup, page 44 pof the BS manual - thick smoke from artillery missions will not block thermals.

IR is not low light image intensification, no? It reads emitted and lack of heat, as revealed through the IR spectrum. Llii amplifies the existing emitted and reflected light, which is in the visible (and totally separate) spectrum. Thamuch smoke would definitely screw with Low light intensification - smoke particles would diffuse & diffract emitted & reflected light. So it must have been thermals, from a devil Bulat spider tank....

Said the spider to the fly!

Awwwwww. That was a very useful truck to lose. Oh well, thank goodness it wasn't a AFV of some kind. Lesson learned - and tactics adjusting!

So, playing my second PBEM v. Abbasid. I generally accept the gaem mechanics for what they are, but this seems a little like a bug to me. SITREP: Urban RUS attack into tree lined UKR city. UKR forces are along North edge of map. One of my trucks turns north onto a north-south street, keeping to the road edge. 50 yards later a suspected tank shell splatters it. Now, 70% of the 1Km+ street between the truck and the tank is filled with drifting arty smoke, explosions and the street is heavily tree lined. The smoke has been there for this and the previous turns, with this turn being much heavier. I thought RUS arty smoke was IR opaque. The damn street is filled with smoke,and was already heavily smoked before the truck even turned onto the street. That smoke block was the prime reason i put the truck there in the first place. How the hell did a Bulat (or possibly a BMP, but I doubt it) see that far, through THAT much smoke? I doubt even an Abrams could. (Image cropped and modified to preserve OPSEC ..)

I agree above. I find it critical in battle to show where and what just strawberry jammed my elite T90 pixeltovarisch.

Is thus accurate experience for the real life tankers amongst us? Curious.

no video for this sorry, CM helper deleted too many saves. Actually not goign to use it any more, straight copy paste to DB is better and gives me turn history. Abbassid and I are just starting a new MOUT, a bit larger with some proper suburbia and more foliage. He's UKR this time! Brave soul.... My biggest fundamental mistake on this was my lack of understanding and knowledge of the force selections screen and process. I didn't pay attention to the fact that NONE of my BMPs OR my T90s had arena or shtora. Just smoke. Also, I neglected to properly integrate my line infantry with the supporting weapons, engineers/MG teams. And like a foll I had only one FO! This time I'm going to spend a LOT more time on how my infantry is structured, backed up and operates. My arty skills need some serious work too....

TO DO: - Harmonise Vehicle & Weapon profile pics with the new UI. (T90A, T90AM, BMP-3M & Tunguska are finished examples). - Harmonise editor icons for terrain, AI work and object orintation with new UI - Revise crew portraits (some new ones for RUS already, but not good enough). - Alternate splash screens, backgrounds - Harmonise briefing, objectives screens with new UI - Redo Force Choice screen again - Harmonise armor, ammo, etc icons - Finish/revise special equipment icons (4-5 left) KP

Update on my progress with a personal revamp of the CM:BS UI, into a much more modern, minimalist style. Editor UI is almost finished - still need to mod the terrain/unit/building icons and the Force icons for US/UKR/RUS. Game UI is finished, except for the vehicle/weapon profile pics. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ I've always felt the current Ui was terribly cluttered, with far too many borders, curves and generally unnecessary decoration. I know that many people like a UI with character or overt style - I personally don't. I don't care about extruded borders or embbssed, recessed, outlined icons. I just want the information and the commands. Everything else is secondary. This version strips away a LOT of stuff, especially the pronounced borders. I've also shifted to colour palette to a neutral grey / strong black, with white for text and mid blue, strong red for highlighting of selections and buttons. Some things I have no control over, such as the cyan background in the title bar in that first screen shot. Or the end curves forced on the highlighting bars. But all in all, I've managed to change about 90% of the UI. I personally find this version far, far cleaner, clearer and more visually coherent than the current UI, even at this WIP stage. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Side by Side examples below. INTRO DATA SCREEN UNITS SCREEN AI SCREEN The main game interface is also heavily modded in the same style, although with a black base rather than the light grey for the editor. I used a black base as otherwise there is a displeasing break between the UI and the large black spaces to its left and right - ie. the UI does not scale to the monitor resolution, it simply fills in the difference with black. The command buttons on the right get a different colour for each when highlighted/selected. Doesn't show up in screenies, but its there. I'm in the process of harmonising the weapon/vehicle portraits with the new UI. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Its a pretty nasty bug for the RU side..the Kriz is one of the key equalizers against US armor. Especially at night/bad weather.....

Either he'll accept or Ill fight a retreat. Either way, I dont have the force to attack with out it turning into a needless slaughter. I'm not going to do a lessons learned, as I want to keep those as a surprise for the next match, if there is one. One question i do have - holy ****, Russian arrty is slow to respond. What time frame do i need to keep in mind? I ordered strikes , I think, about over 7 turns ago... still nothing. This was a major reason in my decision. I lost too many important units, unprotected by requested smoke or supressive arty.

So, I'm offering a cease fire. ------------------------------- I've made some major mistakes in force selection and organisation, as well as my artillery prep and follow on fires. My main mistake was not protecting my BMPs (era/aps/arty smoke screens) - my losses there have been far too heavy, Its now limiting what I can do with them, as in, basically, I cannot properly attack. Even an AT4 kills them. Silly.... A lot of my inf units are very rattled and only lightly armed with RPGs. Sending them on an attack would be criminal. So, I cannot properly cover my brittle infantry as they advance. my T90s died way too fast. I charged ahead, treating my tanks as cavalry, rather than snipers. Newbie mistake, especially with rain.I'm down to a couple of ATGM teams and a T90.T90s are in good crossfire positions, but vulnerable to outflanking and precision fire. Organizationally, I did not understand how mix in support teams to a coherent chain of command, or create properly integrated mech inf units with sufficient and correct organic firepower and specialists.In the CM:BS environment, that mistake cost me heavily. I COULD push ahead and try to use aggression to advance, but my force is brittle and i dont have the anti-armor to defeat his M1s, or his hitherto-unseen Bradleys.... i'm highly vulnerable to a counter attack - my reserves could slow him down, but a concentrated mech assault would take me apart.

You're thinking of CM: Shock Force.

Great stuff! But what does this look like at night?

Ugh. Some bad moments. Lost my left Hook Tunguska to a, well, not sure really. Precision Arty or a mine, dunno, but total hull loss. Smoke intended to blond his centre line has instead land in the open centre ground, screwing with my crossfire arcs on his central M1A2. Right flank list 3 BMPs in a debacle of crappie manoeuvring. Lesson learned: NEVER, *EVER* ATTACK LEFT -*AND* RIGHT AT A T-JUNCTION. Choose one arm of the T, and concentrate. I've pulled Right Flank back, going to withdraw rapido before those M1A2s charge forward. Still have 2 mech Co on reserve. T90s sitting quiet, some small adjustment to anticipate a possible US counter attack on the right. Remaining Tunguska has trashed his front line buildings facing my Left Hook, then bailed off. Dropboxxed my latest play but getting the notification email bounced back from a full in box. Oh well....

No screens yet, but I'm building a little sequence of videos using fraps to capture. My attack has, well, if not stalled, it's certainly hit the main resist a qwerty nce. I have a new and deep respect for the wealth of weaponry organic to a US platoon. Holy crap, they can lay down a wal! Othe other hand, I have two Tunguska, one if which I believe has accounted for an entire US platoon by itself through direct fire and dropping a 5 story building on them. Very satisfying, especially as I think it caught them mid firefight, in the flank, and trapped too high up to get out in time. PLUS it was the platoon that Butchered my two BMPs and the squad of men earlier! Anyhow Left hook is pushing forward, using the diagonal housing row to screen it's advance. It's a tricky job advancing around all these corners. I've lost a couple of BMPs to ambush, due to their ****ty optics, so now I tend to micromanage their first & manoeuvre. This adds the danger of an unseen/fast moving US element catching my IFVs in an unexpected angle/move but it means I lay down a fairly comprehensive suppression. I'm manoeuvring my left Tunguska in with the Left Hook advance, but it's really to set up for a brutal and hopefully enfilading fire on his centre. A nasty little surprise I'm pulling together.... My right flank Tunguska is GTFO from its current position, racing across the boulevard to get a better flanking angle on that main US grouping facing my left hook. I've arranged a bunch of targeted suppression north along the boulevard to cover the Tunguska's movement: I really don't want Abassid to get a lock on it. C enter is holding, watching, waiting..... Right Flank has run into a hard US line, supported by 1, possibly 2 Abrams. This is a tense few turns while I fire/manoeuvre my left hook forward, waiting for my Arty strikes on its opposition to finally hit home.

Good to know, but there is a whole separate forum for opponent finding, listed at the bottom on the main forum listing page.

"continue to mercilessly pound every ID'd infantry position with several vehicles at once and it seems to really be laying waste to the US." So you're using direct manual targeting? Or narrow arcs? My experience is units would take fire on Maybes, I have to manually direct target, which leaves me vulnerable to counter manoeuvre, or ambush.

What about a boat load of CAS? pretty expensive, and if he goes extreme numbers he could create a Highway of Death on exposed armor, Tunguska be dammed. Hell, if he takes those out he's got a good chance. Tanks in the sky, basically...

You have no eyes on that flank? Hope it's empty!